Method Man Says He's Never Made Any Money From Streaming

Method Man has revealed that he’s yet to earn any streaming income from his music, despite his success as a solo artist and with Wu-Tang Clan.

The rap legend made the surprise revelation during an interview with Wale Ogunleye, Head of Sports & Entertainment at UBS, that was released on Hot 97’s YouTube channel.

While discussing the rise of artificial intelligence and its impact on artists and other creatives, Meth said: “I’m still trying to figure out AI but I have seen some things that have made me raise an eyebrow — the Drake diss with the [fake] 2Pac and Snoop, the fake Kendrick [diss songs]. It’s a lot to it.

“I mean, I think it goes way deeper than that, especially when it comes to IPs [intellectual property] for artists that came from my era. Because honestly I’ve never gotten a streaming check for any of my music.”

He added: “Like I said, I’m still trying to figure it all out because there may be someone who can make a perfect mix of the two where — I’m not saying to accept it, but at least make art out of it, and that’s what I’m always for, the creative part.”

Method Man didn’t go into further detail about the ownership of his music or publishing and why he has yet to see a dime from streaming services, as he claims.

The Tical MC isn’t the first rapper to voice complaints with the current streaming model and its payout rates for artists.

Last year, Snoop Dogg shed light on some of the economics of streaming, revealing how little money he received from his publishing company after achieving one billion streams on Spotify.

“In the streaming world, I could show you right now, they sent me some shit from Spotify where I got a billion streams,” he said on the Business Untitled podcast.

“My publisher hit me. I said, ‘Break that down. How much money is that?’ That shit wasn’t even $45,000.”

It was unclear from the interview whether Snoop was talking about the entire amount of money he made from the billion streams or, since he mentioned speaking to his publisher, whether he was referring to just the publishing royalties (which are divided among all the songwriters, split between the music and lyric sides).

More recently, Metro Boomin also expressed disapproval over streaming payouts and hinted that his future albums may not be released on platforms like Spotify and Apple Music.

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The super-producer shared a post on Instagram which said: “A fan needs to stream an artist’s music 20 times a day for a whole year for that artist to make $25 from a fan.”

Metro wrote over it: “This is why my next album will probably be the last one streaming.”

Steps have been made in recent months in hopes of increasing the amount of money that streaming services pay to artists, though.

In March, Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) introduced a new bill in the U.S. House of Representatives calling for payouts to be upped from a fraction of a penny per stream to one penny per stream.

Titled the Living Wage For Musicians Act, the legislation proposes the establishment of a new royalty fund that would pay artists directly, bypassing labels altogether.

The proposal would be funded by an additonal fee to every streaming subscription equal to 50 percent of the subscription price, anywhere from $4 to $10.

The bill would also introduce a royalty cap for songs that receive at least one million monthly streams, with royalties generated by the tracks beyond that number to be divided among all artists.